UNIVERZITA PALACKÉHO V OLOMOUCI PEDAGOGICKÁ FAKULTA
KATEDRA ANGLICKÉHO JAZYKA A LITERATURY
Diplomová práce
Bc. Zuzana Kopecká
Gerunds and –ing participles and their translation into Czech
Olomouc, 2012 vedoucí práce: Mgr. Silvie Válková, Ph.D.
Pro hlá šení Prohlašuji, že jsem tuto diplomovou práci vypracovala samostatně pod vedením Mgr. Silvie
Válkové, Ph.D., a uvedla v ní veškerou použitou literaturu i ostatní zdroje uvedené v seznamu
použité literatury.
Souhlasím současně s užitím práce ke studijním účelům.
V Olomouci dne …………………. …….……………… podpis
P o d ě k o v á n í
Chtěla bych touto cestou poděkovat své vedoucí práce, Mgr. Silvii Válkové, Ph.D., za její
odborné vedení, ochotu, čas a trpělivost při zpracovávání této diplomové práce. Dále bych chtěla
poděkovat své rodině a lidem, kteří mě při jejím psaní podporovali a kteří mi pomáhali, zejména
své mamince, Jarmile Kopecké, jejíž podpora a povzbuzení mi pomohly nejvíce.
CONTENTS
1 INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................6
2 INTRODUCTION TO NON-FINITE VERB FORMS AND CLAUSES.......................8
2.1 Non-finite verb forms ......................................................................................................8
2.2 Functions and syntactic roles of non-finite verb forms .....................................................9
2.3 Non-finite clauses..........................................................................................................10
3 GERUND................................................................................................................11
3.1 Form of a gerund ...........................................................................................................13
3.2 Functions of a gerund ....................................................................................................14
3.3 Gerund reference ...........................................................................................................15
3.4 Gerund in nominal clauses.............................................................................................17
3.5 Summary of a gerund ....................................................................................................18
4 –ING PARTICIPLE.................................................................................................20
4.1 Syntactic functions of –ing participle.............................................................................21
4.1.1 –ing participle as attribute ............................................................................................ 21
4.1.2 –ing participle as an object complement ....................................................................... 22
4.2 –ing participle as a part of progressive aspect ................................................................22
4.3 –ing participle as a part of nonfinite –ing clause ............................................................23
4.3.1 Sentence condensation ................................................................................................. 25
4.3.2 Dangling –ing participle............................................................................................... 27
4.4 –ing participle vs. gerund..............................................................................................28
5 CZECH PARTICIPLES ..........................................................................................30
5.1 Forms of Czech participles ............................................................................................30
5.1.1 Present participle ......................................................................................................... 30
5.1.2 Past participle .............................................................................................................. 31
6 TRANSLATION OF ENGLISH GERUNDS AND –ING PARTICIPLES INTO THE
CZECH LANGUAGE.....................................................................................................33
6.1 Translation of gerunds ...................................................................................................33
6.2 Summary of translation of English gerunds into Czech..................................................36
6.3 Translation of –ing participles and clauses.....................................................................36
6.4 Summary of translation of –ing participles into Czech...................................................39
7 RESEARCH ...........................................................................................................41
7.1 Introduction of the research ...........................................................................................41
7.2 Methods of the questionnaire.........................................................................................42
7.3 Questionnaire analysis...................................................................................................42
7.3.1 Translating gerund ....................................................................................................... 43
7.3.2 Summary of translated gerunds and comparison of schools .......................................... 56
7.3.3 Translating –ing participles .......................................................................................... 56
7.3.4 Summary of translated –ing participles and comparison of schools ............................... 69
7.3.5 Arrangement of the sentences according to their difficulty of translating .................... 70
7.4 Student’s Books used at the schools...............................................................................71
7.5 Conclusion of the research.............................................................................................73
8 CONCLUSION .......................................................................................................75
6
1 Introduction
A lot of English learners have lots of problems with understanding the system of English
tenses, especially with understanding the progressive aspect and its meaning in the Czech
language. When they learn the –ing forms, they do not realize it. It has been my teaching
experience which encouraged me to write about this topic.
The aim of this diploma thesis is to describe one of the non-finite forms of verbs, –ing
participles. In the first chapter of the theoretical part, I will summarise all the non-finite verb
forms and clauses, and briefly introduce the –ing participle, which is the main focus of this
thesis. In the second chapter, I will focus on the first type of the –ing participles, a gerund. I will
describe various views of several grammarians, and the differences in their view of the gerund's
functions and what it expresses. In the third chapter, I will focus on the –ing participle as a part
of a progressive aspect of verbs and in condensed clauses, its functions and forms in a sentence
and the main difference between a gerund and –ing participle. The next chapter will introduce
the Czech present and past participles and shows the correct endings of both the participles. In
the final chapter, I will make a basic comparison between English and Czech concerning these
forms and how they are translated into the Czech language so as to be understandable for the
Czech native speaker.
For the research part, which was conducted at three different secondary schools and
focussed on the pupils in 9th grade, using the A2 level vocabulary that corresponds with those
grades, I defined these hypotheses:
1) they translate the English gerund as the Czech verbal noun, ending with –í,
2) if they translate it, they use a word-for-word translation which is in some cases
incomprehensible for the Czech-speaking person,
3) they do not know the term “gerund” because they do not need to know it at secondary
school but they use it very often and they know how to translate it into Czech,
4) they translate the gerund as the deverbal noun which is not the equivalent of the
English gerund,
5) the Czech pupils translate the English –ing participle as the Czech archaic participle
and when they translate it, they do not use the correct ending,
7
6) they have difficulties with translating the present progressive tense although it is
revised many times at secondary school.
The methods used were questionnaire analysis and comparison of the student’s books
used at the schools at which the research was conducted. Example sentences were taken from my
teaching practice and according to various syntactic positions in a sentence.
As the resources for the theoretical part, I have used the grammar books written by the
respected linguists both English and Czech, such as Sidney Greenbaum, Randolph Quirk, Libuše
Dušková, Vilém Mathesius, etc. I have translated the Czech authors Libuše Dušková, Vilém
Mathesius, Jarmila Tárnyiková, etc. and indicated it in the footnotes.
.
8
2 Introduction to non-finite verb forms and clauses
2.1 Non-finite verb forms
Verb phrases are either finite or non-finite. A finite verb is a verb that carries a contrast
in tense between the present and past, and may also be marked for person and number. In a finite
verb phrase the first or only verb is finite, and the other verbs (if any) are non-finite. In a non-
finite verb phrase all the verbs are non-finite. Play and played are finite verbs in these sentences:
We play football every day. [1]
We played in a football match last week. [2]
Play is in the present tense in [1] and played is in the past tense in [2].1
We will play some football later today. [3]
We have played football every day this week. [4] (Greenbaum, 1993 : 56, 57)
In [3] and [4] the verbs play and played are non-finite and they follow the auxiliary verbs
will and have in the sentences. In [3] the auxiliary verb is will, indicating the future, in [4] have,
which is indicating a present perfect tense. Auxiliary verbs are verbs which help to provide extra
information about a tense, voice, modality, and aspect. If we consider the sentences from the
point of view of verb phrases, both are finite because the auxiliary verbs in connection with will
and played function as the main verbs.
According to Greenbaum (Greenbaum, 1993 : 57), the following are the non-finite verb
forms:
1. the infinitive, often introduced by to: (to) phone
2. the –ing participle (including a gerund according to some authors2): phoning
3. the –ed participle: phoned
Such phrases do not normally occur as the verb phrase of an independent clause. (Quirk,
Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 150)
1 author’s note 2 author’s note
9
When defining a finite verb form, we can identify that it has tense, mood, person, number, aspect
and voice. At non-finite verbs or non-finite verb forms, all the verb grammatical categories are
impossible to identify. We can define only their aspect and voice.
When we want to transform a finite verb phrase ending with –ing participle into a non-
finite, we omit the auxiliary to be.
Compare the following examples:
They caught him smoking cigarettes. (when he was smoking3) [1]
Smoking cigarettes is dangerous. [2]
(Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 153)
In [1] we are speaking about a non-finite verb form which gives a sentence the meaning
because it complements the sentence, in [2] we are speaking about a verbal noun called a gerund.
In these examples, we have omitted the initial auxiliary to be which helps to form the progressive
aspect. Omission of the auxiliary helps us to form two types of –ing verb forms – a gerund
(mentioned above) and present –ing participle which are the focus of the following two chapters.
2.2 Functions and syntactic roles of non-finite verb forms
1. the infinitive – it can appear in the position of a subject, object, as a part of a predicate
(after a modal verb, auxiliary and finite verb), part of an adjective complementation,
adverbial infinitive (mostly adverbial of purpose), and attributive infinitive (pre- and
postmodification).
2. the –ing participle (also called a present participle) – it has two types – a) a gerund – it
can stand in the position of a subject, direct object, subject complement, appositive,
adjectival complementation, prepositional complement (Quirk, 1995 : 1063), b) present
participle – it can be found in the position of an attribute, object complement, and part
of adjectival complementation, and part of a progressive aspect (Dušková, 1994)
3. the –ed participle (also called a past participle) – this participle can appear in the
position of a modifier (it can modify a noun) and function therefore as an adjective,
then it appears in a perfective aspect verb form, and in a passive voice form. 3 author’s note
10
The syntactic functions of –ing participles are described more in the chapters about a gerund and
–ing participle.
2.3 Non-finite clauses
Non-finite clauses function as either subordinate clauses (–ing clauses and –ed clauses) or
they can have a grammatical role of a noun, adjective, or a adverb. The clauses contain a non-
finite verb form. Here are three types of non-finite clauses according to Greenbaum (Greenbaum,
1993 : 107), depending on the form of the first verb in the verb phrase:
1. infinitive clauses with to and without to, e.g. They wanted to pay for their meal. We
helped unlock the car. (in these cases, the clause functions as a noun and is in the
syntactical position of an object)
2. –ing clauses (or –ing participle clauses), e.g. Just thinking about the final round put
him in a combative mood. (the gerund form in the syntactical position of a subject)
3. –ed clauses (or –ed participle clauses), e.g. Dressed in street clothes, the patients
strolled in the garden.
The non-finite clauses can occur either at the beginning, at the end, or in the middle of a
sentence. The clauses can be divided by commas, depending on the position in the sentence and
the function which they serve. In the to infinitive clauses, they are not divided because they
function as a single unit (e.g. To drink water from a bottle is uncomfortable) and not as a
sentence condensation. Condensation is the process of transforming the finite clause into non-
finite clause (more about condensation in chapter No. 3.3.1).
11
3 Gerund “Eighty percent of success is showing up."
(Woody Allen)
The general characteristic of a gerund is that it is a non-finite form which is formed by
adding an –ing ending after a verb.
It is the form formed from the old verbal noun (see below) ending –ung, as in Old English
leornung “learning”. (see Algeo, Pyles, 2005).
gerund is the term used for the non-finite verbal –ing form having prevailingly
nominal features (but keeping the features of the verb in its complementation):
syntactic position within the sentence and similar determination, e.g. His coming
late was rather offensive. (Hornová, 2003 : 37).
a verb form which functions as a noun, in Latin ending in -ndum (declinable), in
English ending in –ing (e.g. asking in do you mind my asking you?) (Hornby,
2007 : 648).
gerunds are similar to present participles; they both have an –ing suffix. However,
gerunds differ in that they are not qualifiers; they name actions, behaviours, or
states. Gerunds are frequently called verbal nouns (O'Dwyer, 2006 : 61).
according to Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech and Svartvik, (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech,
Svartvik, 1995 : 1064), a gerund is a verb of the nominal –ing clauses which are
sometimes called “gerundive” or “gerundival clauses”.
All authors apart from Quirk et al. describe a gerund on its own. Only Quirk et al.
describe it as a part of a nominal clause. This can be explained by the fact that the gerund is
usually followed by various sentence elements, e.g. by adverbial, “of” genitive, object, etc.
All the definitions speak about a gerund being a verb form. If we consider the
grammatical categories of a verb, we will find that not all of them can be applied to the gerund
(we can apply only aspect, voice, and time reference). Therefore we have to be careful about
confusing the gerund with the present progressive participle because present progressive
12
participles have the features of a verb only. On the other hand, gerunds primarily have the
features of a noun, although both forms look the same. Compare the following:
reading books vs. the reading of the books
In the first example, we are speaking about the gerund, in the second example about the
deverbal noun. To reiterate, the gerund functions as a noun but does not possess the grammatical
categories of a noun (“of” genitive, preceding by the article, the plural form, etc.)
There is a fluent transition between both forms (the gerund and deverbal noun). Compare the
following:
“His drawing fascinated me”, which can express a) the result of a verbal action; b) the act of a
verbal action (an activity or process or a way of an action); c) the fact of a verbal action (the fact
that he was drawing). (Dušková, 1994 : 569)4.
In a), we are referring to a deverbal noun similar to deverbal nouns formed by various suffixes (-
tion, -al, -ity, -ment, etc.). It is distinguished by all noun features: it forms a plural, it has an
adjective modification, it can be predetermined by an article and it can be complemented by an
“of” genitive, e.g. His drawings fascinate me. Old drawings of towns fascinate me. He made a
rough drawing of the flat. In b), we are speaking about expressing the act itself – the way he
quickly drew the picture fascinated me. Even this time we can premodify it with an article,
forming the past and passive forms is also impossible and we can replace it by a different noun.
In c), we are speaking about expressing the gerund because it preserves the verbal features –
instead of an adjectival modification, we can use an adverbial modification (His drawing the
picture so quickly fascinated me) (Dušková, 1994 : 569, 570)5 and we can replace it by an
infinitive, e.g. To draw the picture so quickly makes me happy.
Some paintings of Brown’s, Brown’s paintings of his daughter – these are deverbal nouns with a
plural ending. It could be replaced by pictures or photos; it is thus a perfectly regular concrete
countable noun, related only to the verb paint by word formation. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech,
Svartvik, 1995 : 1291)
To summarise, a deverbal noun has the features of a noun and lacks the features of a verb which,
on the other hand, is typical for a gerund, e.g. Swimming is fun. → we can replace swimming by
4 author’s translation 5 author’s translation
13
to swim. It is usually a concrete noun which can be replaced by another noun with a similar
meaning.
According to Quirk et al. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 1521), we should not
confuse the gerund with a deverbal noun because it is defined as being “derived from verbs”.
The term deverbal applied to nouns is not synonymous with the term verbal noun which we use
only for the “gerund” class of nouns in –ing.
So since the gerund has features of both a verb and a noun, as is mentioned above, we call it a
verbal noun. It was formed by the process of nominalization. According to Quirk, it is a word or
a phrase which was formed by this process and it has a systematic correspondence with a clause
structure related morphologically to a verb.
The gerund shares many of its syntactic properties with the infinitive with to. Thus both
may occur as the subject, object or nominal predicate of a sentence, though only the gerund can
take noun-qualifiers6. (Zandvoort, 1969 : 25)
The English language uses the gerund more often than other languages. It is not only a verbal
noun but a real verb form which is complemented by an object like a real verb. (Mathesius, 2001
: 64, 65)7
3.1 Form of a gerund
The –ing form of both regular and irregular verbs is formed by adding –ing /ıŋ/ to the
base:
walk ~ walking agree ~ agreeing push ~ pushing
sing ~ singing pass ~ passing weep ~ weeping (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik,
1995 : 98, 99)
It is a verbal noun – a “gerund” class of nouns in –ing. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech,
Svartvik, 1995 : 1521)
6 adjective, adverb or modifier 7 author’s translation
14
Sunbathing is dangerous. Do you like sunbathing? (Hutchinson, 1998 : 52)
The gerund can have its own subject which can be different from the subject of a predicate e.g. A
mother teaches her child walking. (see Mathesius, 2001 : 67)8, Her child is the subject of
walking (= the child will be walking after he learns how to do it), which is an object of teaches,
and a mother is a subject of teaches = two different subjects in one sentence.
This construction is more usual in English than in Czech because the gerund (along with all the
participial forms) has a more free usage in English. (see Mathesius, 2001 : 68)9
3.2 Functions of a gerund
Gerund may function as:
subject: Watching television keeps them out of mischief.
direct object: He enjoys playing practical jokes.
subject complement: Her first job had been selling computers.
appositive: His current research, investigating attitudes to racial stereotypes, takes up
most of his time.
adjectival complementation: They are busy preparing a barbecue.
prepositional complement: I’m responsible for drawing up the budget. (Quirk,
Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 1063)
Dušková also adds one more function of a gerund – adverbial – which is usually used after a
preposition. A non-preposition gerund occurs only as a destination after verbs of movement, e.g.
She’s gone shopping; do you often go swimming? (see Dušková, 1994)
8 author’s translation 9 author’s translation
15
The gerund preserves all syntactic relations in the verb phrase, it is complemented by an
accusative object and adverbials in the same way as other verb forms, e.g. Buying cheap
stationary, America’s coming of age, investing in paper mills, etc.
The “inner subject”10 remains unspecified as a “general subject”, e.g. The
nightmare consisted of being dead in a coffin in prison from eating Pop Tarts (we
do not know who is dead in the coffin).
The gerund can be preceded by a possessive pronoun, e.g. I thought you liked my
showing an interest in your work.
The gerund can be preceded by a possessive case, e.g. Lydia’s going to Brighton
was all that consoled her for the melancholy conviction of her husband’s never
intending to go there himself.
The gerund can appear in an objective or accusative case of object constructions,
e.g. I remember her being amused and touched by the movie.
The gerund can follow a preposition which we call a prepositional complement
(see above), e.g. I do think the stuff about him disgracing himself on the baseball
field is silly. (Bělíček, 1994 : 358, 360).
3.3 Gerund reference
A gerund may refer to a fact or an action:
fact: Your driving a car to New York in your condition disturbs me greatly. [1]
action: Your driving a car to New York took longer than I expected. [2] (Quirk,
Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 1064)
(If we consider the –ing participle, it expresses an activity which is in progress.)
10 The subject that is different from the subject of the main clause, it stands in the subjective or “nominative” case. e.g. Dick parted from him, the garrison of Castlewood being ordered away. (in this sentence, we do not know who ordered the garrison away = inner subject), (Bělíček, 1994 : 358)
16
When an –ing form occurs alone or preceded just by a genitive noun phrase, the
construction can sometimes be syntactically ambiguous between an –ing clause and a noun
phrase with a verbal noun in –ing as its head:
My hobby is swimming. [3]
I hate lying. [4]
They liked our singing. [5]
Our singing in [5] can refer either to the action of singing or to the mood of singing.
Without further expansion by an object or an adverbial, the genitive (our) biases towards a mood
interpretation. In contrast, the objective (us) in [5a] allows only an action interpretation:
They liked us singing (they liked when we were singing). [5a]
Since the –ing forms in [1] and [2] do not allow a mood interpretation, it appears that this
interpretation belongs to the noun phrase structure rather than to the clause structure. Similarly,
when we expand [5] by adding an object and thereby making the –ing construction
unambiguously a clause, the mood interpretation is no longer available.
They liked our singing folk songs. (action = gerund)
When the –ing form is alone and is the direct object, as in [4], two interpretations of the
implied subject are often possible. Thus, I hate lying may mean “I hate when I lie”, linking the
action specifically to the subject of the superordinate clause, or it may generalize (“I hate when
people lie”). When the –ing construction contains a direct object or an adverbial and is therefore
unambiguously clausal, the usual interpretation is that there is an implicit link to the
superordinate subject:
I hate lying. = telling lies [“I hate it when I tell lies.”]
They enjoy singing while playing the guitar. [“They enjoy it when they sing while
playing the guitar.”]
But this restriction is not absolute. It does not apply after verbs of speaking, where the
generic interpretation holds:
17
She condemned attacking defenceless citizens. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik,
1995 : 1065)
3.4 Gerund in nominal clauses
If the –ing clause has a subject, the item realizing the subject may be in the genitive case
or otherwise in the objective case (for pronouns having a distinctive objective case), or common
case (for all other noun phrases). In general, the genitive is preferred if the item is a pronoun, the
noun phrase has personal reference, and the style is formal:
I intend to voice my objections to their receiving an invitation to our meeting.
The genitive is avoided when the noun phrase is lengthy and requires a group genitive:
Do you remember the students and teachers protesting against the new rule?
On the other hand, the genitive case is preferred when the item is initial in the sentence:
My forgetting her name was embarrassing.
Some are troubled by the choice of case here. In some instances, an acceptable alternative is a
that-clause, which is normally extraposed:
It was embarrassing that I forgot her name.
Unlike subject that-clause and to-infinitive clauses, subject –ing clauses are not normally
extraposed. The superordinate clause can be interrogative or passive without extraposition:
Will our saving energy reduce the budget deficit?
Postponing the proposed legislation is being considered by the subcommittee. (Quirk,
Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 1064)
An –ing clause may be the subject of a bare existential clause, in which case it normally
appears in non-assertive context. With the –ing clause that has a genitive as its subject, this
construction is anomalous because the –ing form is preceded by a determiner, generally no and
less commonly any:
18
There’s no mistaking that voice. [One could not mistake that voice.] [1]
There were no lighting fireworks that day. [“One could not have lit fireworks that day.”]
[2]
There isn’t any telling what they will do. [“One could not tell what they will do.”] [3]
There must be no standing beyond the yellow line. [“One must not stand beyond the
yellow line.”] [4]
If the –ing construction contains a direct object, it is generally paraphrasable with modal
auxiliaries, as in [1-3]. In [4], where the construction lacks an object, a modal auxiliary is present
in the sentence. Abbreviated forms with just the negative –ing clauses generally have the force of
a prohibition:
No smoking. No parking here. No playing loud music. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech,
Svartvik, 1995 : 1066)
The gerund also occurs in the function of a noun modifier in both in pre-position and
post-position. We can see a gerund pre-modification of a noun in the examples, such as dining
table, filling station, ironing board, sleeping pill, spending money, swimming pool, flying time,
etc. (Dušková, 1994 : 577)11
The proof that these phrases are gerund phrases can be seen if they are deconstructed – dining
table = a table for dining (not the table that is dining), sleeping pill = a pill for sleeping (not a pill
that is sleeping), swimming pool = a pool for swimming (not a pool that is swimming). This can
help us to recognize if the preceding –ing form is a gerund or not.
3.5 Summary of a gerund
To sum up a gerund, it is a verb form ending with –ing and has the features of both the
noun and the verb.
1. verbal features 11 author’s translation
19
it uses the same prepositional or non-prepositional structure as the verb, e.g. to
build a house vs. building a house
it can express the active and passive voice, e.g. You should give up smoking.
(active) I don’t like being disturbed. (passive)
it can distinguish present and past time reference and aspect, e.g. I don’t mind
going on foot. We don’t like his having been writing letters to me,
it can be replaced by the to infinitive.
2. nominal features
it functions as a subject, object, complement, and appositive in a sentence, e.g.
Driving a car requires a driving license. (object)
it can be preceded by a preposition, e.g. I was congratulated on having finished
my studies.
it can be preceded by the ’s genitive or pronouns, e.g. Excuse my interrupting you.
it can function as an adjective and premodify a noun, e.g. chewing gum,
swimming pool.
20
4 –ing participle "God is a comedian, playing to an audience too afraid to laugh."
(Voltaire)
A word formed from a verb, ending in –ing (= the present participle) (Hornby 2007 :
1104).
The –ing participle functions as:
a) a part of a progressive aspect following the verb “to be”: He’s calling her now.
b) a sentence condenser: Coming early, I found her at home.
c) an attribute, e.g. running water, etc.
d) an object complement, e.g. I saw him watching TV.
It corresponds to the Czech verbal adjective and participle. (Dušková, 1994 : 580)12
It is a non-finite verb form, which is used as a part of complex (analytical) verb
phrases, for sentence condensation, as a determiner, etc. The present participle is
often referred to as the –ing form. Participial phrases (complex forms of
participles) can express the grammatical category of an aspect and voice, e.g.
Having been waiting… - perfect and progressive aspect, Having been invited… -
perfect aspect, passive voice. (Hornová, 2003 : 55, 56).
a word formed from a verb (e.g. going, gone, being, been) and used as an
adjective (e.g. working woman, burnt toast) or a noun (e.g. good breeding). In
English, participles are also used to make compound verb forms (e.g. is going,
has been).13
12 author’s translation 13 Oxford Dictionaries. Participle [online]. [cit. 15.2.2012]. Dostupné z: <http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/participle>.
21
To sum up, we can use the –ing participle as a determiner, adjective, for sentence condensation,
and to express the grammatical category of aspect, voice, and time reference. Another category
which can be applied to –ing participles is a tense. We cannot use a gerund for sentence
condensation because it primarily functions as a noun and the process of condensation is possible
only for verbal progressive participles.
In comparison with the gerund, the –ing participle can function as an adjective which means that
it modifies a noun and has all the features of an adjective. This also means that, unlike the
gerund, the –ing participle can be intensified and compared, e.g. a more interesting piece of
information, the most surprising statement. Since the –ing participle can function as an adjective,
we can call it a verbal adjective.
According to Bělíček, verbal adjectives represent a class of words on the boundary between
participles and adjectives. Participles are verbal forms with adjective-like traits whose verbal
character is seen in their ability to bear accusative objects: a work consuming much time.
(Bělíček 1994 : 146).
4.1 Syntactic functions of –ing participle
According to Dušková, the –ing participle functions as an attribute and an object
complement in a sentence. (see Dušková, 1994)
4.1.1 –ing participle as attribute
It occurs mostly in cases in which the participle expresses a characteristic or a permanent
attribute, e.g. developing countries, a squeaking door, a weeping willow, an entertaining person,
a house with a winding staircase, etc. The cases when the participle expresses a temporary
feature are more rare, e.g. a growing tendency, a vanishing view, extenuating circumstances,
deafening noise, the visiting team, etc.
An attributive participle corresponds to a relative clause. Compare the following: a leaking pot =
a pot that leaks, a squeaking board = a board that squeaks. The participles gradually approach
adjectives. They can be then intensified and compared, e.g. a very becoming dress, a most
22
astonishing piece of news, a fitting description, the most interesting book (Dušková, 1994 : 580,
581)14
The attribute form is preferred to a relative clause because it is shorter and more concise.
4.1.2 –ing participle as an object complement
It is part of complex transitive complementation which means that the direct object is
followed by a non-finite clause acting as predication adjunct. The non-finite clause has no
subject itself, but its implied subject is always the preceding noun phrase, which is the object of
the superordinate clause. This noun phrase, which, if a personal pronoun is in the objective case,
is commonly termed a raised object: semantically, it has the role of subject of the non-finite
verb; but syntactically it is “raised” from the non-finite clause to function as object of the
superordinate verb. Hence, in general, this noun phrase can become subject of the corresponding
passive. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 1201)
The noun phrase following the superordinate verb cannot take the genitive (or possessive)
form:
I saw him lying on the beach.
The –ing predication can normally be omitted without radically altering the meaning:
I saw him lying on the beach. [I saw him.] (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 :
1206)
4.2 –ing participle as a part of progressive aspect
The progressive combines a form of the auxiliary be with the –ing participle.
(Greenbaum, 1993 : 52)
As its name suggests, the progressive aspect (also sometimes called the durative or
continuous aspect) indicates an event in progress at a given time. Or, according to Greenbaum
(Greenbaum, 1993 : 52), it may also imply that it lasts for only a limited period and that it has
not ended. Compare:
14 author’s translation
23
Simple present: Joan sings well. [1]
Present progressive: Joan is singing well. [2]
These two sentences have the same tense, but different aspects. Notice the difference this makes
to the meaning: Joan sings well refers to Joan’s competence as a singer (that she has a good
voice – a relatively permanent attribute); Joan is singing well refers to her performance on a
particular occasion or during a particular season. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 :
197)
The meaning of the progressive can be separated into three components, not all of which
need be present in a given instance:
a) the event has duration
b) the event has limited duration
c) the event is not necessarily complete. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 98)
A deeper generalization says that the simple present denotes the general, generic, normal,
permanent, standard and customary actions, while the present progressive is designed to refer to
non-standard, exceptional and occasional events. In progressive forms, the emphasis is laid on
personal interest and attitudes, on news, novelties and astonishing communications. (Bělíček,
1994 : 234).
Compare the following:
She goes to school. vs. She is going to school.
In these two examples, the –ing participle refers to an action which is in progress and having a
certain duration. In the example with the present simple tense, the focus is not on the duration
but rather on the habit of going to school.
4.3 –ing participle as a part of nonfinite –ing clause
Nonfinite verb phrases have mood distinction, and cannot occur in construction with the
subject of a main clause.
Finite: He was doing it easily.
24
Nonfinite: He doing it easily. (this sentence is incorrect because the verb “to be”
needed to make the present progressive form is missing and therefore this sentence can not occur
alone15)
Since modal auxiliaries have no non-finite forms, they cannot occur in non-finite verb
phrases. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 153)
Non-finite clauses can be regarded as reduced clauses, reduced in comparison with finite
clauses. They often lack a subject. However, we can analyse them in terms of sentence elements
if we reconstruct them as finite clauses, supplying the missing parts that we understand from the
rest of the sentence. (Greenbaum, 1993 : 107)
If the –ing participle is the first or only verb in the verb phrase, the phrase is non-finite.
Non-finite verb phrases normally do not occur as the verb phrase of an independent sentence.
(Greenbaum, 1993 : 57)
According to Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech and Svartvik, there are seven possible combinations of
participles which are used for reducing the clause:16
simple eating complex having eaten being eating being eaten having been eating having been eaten having been being eaten [rare]
These combinations are used according to the tense of a sentence which is about to be
reduced.
Compare the tense of the following –ing participles:
Eating a heavy breakfast, we prepared for our long journey. [1]
Having eaten a heavy breakfast, we prepared for our long journey. [2]
15 author’s note 16 –ing participle combined with –ed participle
25
In [1], eating and preparation took place at the same time, on the other hand in [2], the breakfast
preceded the preparation. (Quirk, Greenbaum, 1999) More about reducing clauses will follow in
subsequent chapters.
4.3.1 Sentence condensation
The process of changing a finite clause into non-finite is called reducing the clause. This
means that we omit the auxiliary verb and reduce the verb form into one ending with –ing. We
can have sentence condensation either with a subject or without.
Without subject: Leaving the room, he tripped over the mat.
With subject: Her aunt having left the room, I asked Ann for some personal help.
(Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 993)
When a subject is not present in a non-finite clause, the normal attachment rule for
identifying the subject is that it is assumed to be identical in reference to the subject of the
superordinate clause:
Driving home after work, I accidentally went through a red light. [“While I was driving home
after work…”] (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 : 1121)
As sentence condensers, participles are used especially in those cases in which we want
to shift the secondary or peripheral actions/events into the background against which the main
activities are, as it were, projected. In a sense, most of the participial condensers function as
semi-clausal (or non-finite clauses) of accompanying events, e.g. He stood for a while, staring
into the water, watching the weed flow.
The only finite clause in the above English example (He stood for a while,) is followed by a
sequence of two –ing condensers (semi-clauses), i.e. staring, watching. The semi-clausal
structures introduced by “watching” moreover have an additional complex “accusative-with-
infinitive” structure, i.e. watching the weed flow and turn and watching the brown stones and
surface shimmer. This is an amalgam17 (or fusion) of two predications. (Tárnyiková, 1993 : 78).
Sentence condensation is used mostly in written language. We try to avoid it in spoken language
because it is sometimes difficult to recognize it when speaking.
17 A mixture or combination of different things. (Hornby, 2007 : 44)
26
4.3.1.1 Postmodification by non-finite –ing participle clause
Postmodification of the noun phrase is possible with –ing participle clause.
A tile falling from a roof shattered into fragments at his feet. (“which fell from a roof”)
At the station you will see a lady carrying a large umbrella. (“who will be carrying a
large umbrella”).
It must be emphasized that –ing forms in postmodifying clauses should not be seen as
abbreviated progressive forms in relative clauses. (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik, 1995 :
1263) But not all –ing forms in non-finite postmodifiers correspond to progressive forms in
relative clauses. Stative verbs, which cannot have the progressive in the finite verb phrase, can
appear in participial form:
He is talking to a girl resembling Joan. (“who resembles Joan” not “who is resembling
Joan”)
It was a mixture consisting of oil and vinegar. (“that consisted…”) (Quirk, Grennbaum,
1999 : 372)
In some cases, –ing participles occur in frozen expressions with no relative clause
alternative, e.g. for the time being (not for the time that is). (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, Svartvik,
1995 : 1264)
4.3.1.2 Premodification by –ing participles
Everything here depends on the potentiality of the participle to indicate a permanent or
characteristic feature. To a lesser extent, gradability (especially as indicated through
intensification by very) is involved.
She has a very interesting mind. → Here interesting is fully adjectival.
Someone who told good stories could be a (very) entertaining person but one would not
say this of someone who happened at the moment of speaking to be entertaining his friends with
a good story. (Quirk, Grennbaum, 1999 : 384, 385)
In negative non-finite clauses, the negative particle is generally positioned before the
verb:
27
It’s his fault for not doing anything about it. (Greenbaum, Quirk, 1999 : 994)
4.3.2 Dangling –ing participle
This is a participle which is a word that can function as a verb or an adjective, and it
usually ends in –ing. (Knight, 2003 : 99).
A participle that relates to a noun that is not mentioned. “Dangling participles” are not
considered correct. In the sentence “While walking home, my phone rang”, “walking” is
a dangling participle. A correct form of the sentence would be “While I was walking
home, my phone rang”. (Hornby, 2007 : 385).
Unattached participle, it condenses a clause whose subject is not the same as the subject
of the main clause, but it is not expressed before the participle. Sometimes the
“understood” subject is implied in the structure of the main clause. Such sentences are
more acceptable in scientific literature, e.g. Using similar techniques, the topic can be
presented… (Hornová, 2003 : 28).
Quirk also calls these clauses unattached (like Hornová) because the subject of a non-finite
clause is not identical to the subject of the main clause.
The last two definitions describe the dangling participle as not being correct in common
language which may be because of the fact that when you do not express the subject of one of
the clauses, it gives the impression that the subject of the subjectless clause is the same as the
one with the subject expressed. Therefore English speaking people avoid using dangling
participles.
Dangling participles are tricky words or phrases that change the meaning of a sentence so that
we don't say exactly what we intend. Because of where a participle is placed in a sentence, a verb
that was intended to modify the subject of a sentence confusingly seems to modify the object.
(Lynch, 2008).
In English, the subject of a participial clause is generally supposed to be identical to that of the
main clause. What is important in accepting a given dangling participial construction is
coherence of the situations described in the main clause and the participial clause. E.g. Looking
back on the twenty-five years of fostering children, is there any one memory that stands out for
you? (Radden, Panther, 2011 : 89, 92).
28
Rushing to catch the bus, Bob's wallet fell out of his pocket. → In this sentence, the modifying
clause (Rushing to catch the bus) contains a participle (rushing). The participle is said to be
dangling because the subject of the main clause (Bob's wallet) is not the thing modified by the
initial modifying clause. It was not Bob's wallet that was rushing.
Flying south for the winter, I saw a huge flock of swallows. → The modifying clause (flying
south for the winter) does not modify the subject of the sentence (I). I was not flying south, the
birds were.
Driven to drink by her problems, we see how Janet will come to a sticky end. → The modifier
refers to Janet and not to (we) the subject of the sentence. We are not driven to drink by her
problems, Janet is.
Dangling participles are considered incorrect in written Standard English. The dangling
participial construction evokes a conceptualizer who conceives the situation described in the
main clause. Thanks to its constructional semantics, the dangling participle is especially common
in the text genres which focus on the interaction with the hearer. (Radden, Panther, 2011 : 89,
92).
It is easy to fall into the trap of having dangling participles (modifiers) in our work. They
are not corrected by computer grammar checkers and can be easily overlooked. The more we
look at examples of dangling participles, the more we will be able to spot them and remove them
from our own writing.18
Although it is up to us to decide whether to use it or not, we should try to avoid it in everyday
language as much as possible in order not to confuse the hearer.
4.4 –ing participle vs. gerund
A distinction between –ing participle and gerund is made on the basis of function, not on
that of outward form, but there are cases where it may offer some difficulty. In some of these the
difficulty is only apparent. Thus, in a dancing doll (= doll that dances) or a running man (= a
man who runs) we have to do with present participles, while in a dancing-master (= a teacher or
18 University of Bristol. Dangling participles. [online]. 2002-2010. cit. 29.12.2011. Dostupné z: <http://www.bristol.ac.uk/arts/exercises/grammar/grammar_tutorial/page_30.html>.
29
dancing) or a running competition (= a competition in running) with gerunds. (Zandvoort, 1969 :
44).
A gerund pre-modification differs from the participial one in intonation and semantics. With a
noun, it forms one intonation unit with a falling curve and a primary stress on the first element
and with a secondary stress on the noun. Different semantics are clear from the phrases, e.g.
drinking water = water for drinking, coughing fit = a fit of coughing are both gerunds, running
water = water that runs, convincing arguments = arguments that convince are both –ing
participles (Dušková, 1994 : 577)19
In a dancing doll the participle and the noun have even stress; the participle is pronounced on a
high level tone, the noun on a falling tone. In a dancing-master the noun has weaker stress than
the gerund; the group of gerund plus noun is pronounced on a falling tone (Zandvoort, 1969 :
44).
To sum up the –ing participle:
it can function as a verbal adjective, e.g. running water, paying guests,
it can be used for sentence condensation, e.g. Going home, I met my mother-in-
law.,
it can be used as part of a progressive aspect, e.g. I am watching TV.,
it can be used in a non-finite clause, e.g. a tile falling from the roof,
it can be a part of a dangling participle where the subjects are different, e.g. Going
home, my mobile phone fell onto the ground. The dangling participle is
considered to be incorrect in both spoken and written everyday English,
it differs from the gerund in that it does not have the functions of a noun.
19 author’s translation
30
5 Czech participles20
Czech participles are parallel with English –ing participles.
They take the syntactic position of a complement in a sentence because they have a
relation to both the subject and predicate. We can define the categories of number, tense, mood,
verbal aspect, and gender = these are the categories of both a noun and a verb.
When the participle expresses the time relation of a main verb, we can distinguish the present
and past participle: if we speak about time being in progress, we use the present participle
formed from imperfective verbs; if we speak about time preceding or following the time of a
main verb, we use the past participle formed from perfective verbs when speaking about past
events and the present participle formed of perfective verbs when speaking about future events
(therefore we can call it the future participle, but it is very rare and occurs only in professional
literature). (Bauer, Grepl, 1980 : 176)
In order to use Czech participles correctly, we should know the correct forms and endings.
5.1 Forms of Czech participles
5.1.1 Present participle
It is formed either by the endings:
-a (for verbs, the nouns of which are masculine)
-ouc (for verbs, the nouns of which are feminine and neuter)
-ouce (for verbs of the plural form, the nouns of which are of all genders)
We form this present participle from verbs which have the ending –ou in the 3rd person plural
present tense: nesou – nesa, nesouc, nesouce (Melichar, Styblík, 1967 : 113). Other examples of
such verbs are perou se, hrnou se, etc.21
20 all this chapter was translated by the author from the books by Melichar, Styblík (1967) and Bauer, Grepl (1980) 21 author’s note
31
or by the endings:
-e (-ě) (for verbs, the nouns of which are masculine)
-íc (for verbs, the nouns of which are feminine and neuter)
-íce (for verbs of the plural form, the nouns of which are of all genders)
We form this present participle from verbs which have the ending –í in the 3rd person plural
present tense: ukazují – ukazuje, ukazujíc, ukazujíce; hledí – hledě, hledíc, hledíce. (Melichar,
Styblík, 1967 : 113), e.g. Ukazujíc mi své nové šaty, začala se červenat. Other examples of such
verbs are zalévají, píší, etc.22
To determine to which group the verb belongs, we need to conjugate the verb into the 3rd
person present tense. According to the ending of this form of the verb, we can recognize the
ending of the participle.
5.1.2 Past participle
There are two types of conjugated verbs – the verbs which end with a consonant and the
verbs which end with a vowel.
If the root of the verb ends with a consonant, the verb takes these endings:
-0 (for verbs, the nouns of which are masculine)
-ši (for verbs, the nouns of which are feminine and neuter)
-še (for verbs of the plural form, the nouns of which are of all genders)
e.g. VYNES–L – vynes, vynesši, vynesše
This type of past participle is used very rarely.
If the root of the verb ends with a vowel, the verb takes these endings:
-v (for verbs, the nouns of which are masculine)
-vši (for verbs, the nouns of which are feminine and neuter)
-vše (for verbs of the plural form, the nouns of which are of all genders)
22 author’s note
32
e.g. UKLONI–L – ukloniv se, uklonvši se, uklonivše se (Melichar, Styblík, 1967 :
116), e.g. Uklonivše se zpěvákům, odešli jsme domů.
As with the present participle, to determine to which group the verb belongs, we need to
conjugate the verb into the 3rd person present tense. According to the ending of this form of the
verb, we can recognize the ending of the participle.
The Czech participles belong to a group of rather archaic words and are used very rarely or in
literature to enrich the language.
In older Czech, it was possible to use a participle the subject of which was not identical to
the subject of the main verb (a dangling participle, see above: chapter no. 3 – author’s note), but
the language of today no longer allows it. (Bauer, Grepl, 1980 : 176)
To summarise Czech participles:
we can express the grammatical categories of number, tense, mood, verbal
aspect, and gender from the Czech participle,
they function as a complement in a Czech sentence,
they are used particularly in professional literature,
they are considered to be archaic expressions,
they can express an activity happening simultaneously with another activity
(present participle) or an activity which precedes another activity (past
participle).
33
6 Translation of English gerunds and –ing participles into the Czech language
The difference between English and Czech syntax can be seen when using non-finite or
nominal forms. English uses them much more than Czech. For example, when we speak about
infinitives with to, English has a simple form (make), or with to (to make). In terms of the
infinitives and tenses, English language has two types of infinitive: present infinitive (make, to
make) and past infinitive (have made, to have made). Moreover, English language also possesses
active and passive voice infinitives (be made, to be made, have been made, to have been made).
(Mathesius, 2001 : 65)
The Czech language avoids using the passive voice as much as possible, while English is
characteristic by the frequent use of the passive voice.
What occurs quite often when translating are calques. These are literal translations, meaning a
word-for-word translation. But when translating from one language to another, the translator
must be careful about the structures which occur in both languages.
6.1 Translation of gerunds
In this chapter, I have used a lot of translated gerunds and examples from Dušková’s
grammar book (Dušková, 1994), which is focused on English grammar with a Czech
background, because she concentrates on this translation problem. The examples by Dušková are
marked. I have also used some of my own examples from my teaching experience. These are not
marked.
The first example which will be analysed is:
→ He likes swimming.
There are two ways to translate it – 1. “Rád plave.”, 2. “Má rád plavání.” In the second example,
I have used the Czech verbal noun to demonstrate the typical ending, –í. Here, the gerund in the
English sentence stands in the position of an object.
34
→ My father is responsible for losing my book.
“Můj otec je zodpovědný za ztrátu (popř. ztracení) mých klíčů., Můj otec je zodpovědný za to, že
ztratil mé klíče.” In this case, the ordinary noun “ztráta” was used. In English it is called a
deverbal noun, which was described in the chapter about the gerund. Translating the gerund as a
verbal noun “ztracení” and using the subordinate clause are also possible.
→ Peter finished driving his father’s new red car.
“Peter dořídil nové červené auto svého otce.” In Czech, when we want to express that an action
is finished, we used the prefix do-, e.g. finish reading (dočíst), finish swimming (doplavat), etc.
But using the phrase “dokončit čtení” is not natural for the Czech language.
→ His drawing the picture so rapidly fascinated me.
There are two ways to translate this sentence – a) Fascinovalo mě, že ten obraz nakreslil tak
rychle., b) Skutečnost, že obraz nakreslil tak rychle, mě fascinovala. (Dušková, 1994 : 570) In
this case, it is impossible to translate it word for word using the Czech verbal noun ending –í
because it would become: “Jeho nakreslení obrázku tak rychle mě fascinovalo.” This Czech
sentence structure is strange and looks chaotic. It is impossible to use the Czech verbal noun in
all cases and in this case the relative clause was needed instead. The gerund in the English
sentence here stands in the position of a subject.
→ Its having been drawn rapidly does not detract from its value. (Dušková, 1994 : 569)
“Skutečnost, že byl nakreslen tak rychle, mu neubírá na hodnotě.” In this case, we can see that
the gerund preserves the features of a verb, especially the aspect which shows us the time
reference that the picture was drawn in the past. In the first example, the time reference is
expressed by the past form of a finite verb. As in the example above, the gerund in the English
sentence stands in the position of a subject.
→ His leaving no address was most inconvenient. (Dušková, 1994 : 572)
In this example, the translation should again be made with the help of a relative clause, otherwise
the Czech translation with a verbal noun would be incomprehensible (Jeho nezanechání adresy
bylo nevhodné). In this case: “To, že nezanechal svou adresu, bylo nevhodné”, the gerund is in
the position of a subject. We have used the anaphoric reference of the Czech word “to”. The real
subject is the relative embedded clause, not the expression “to”, it just refers to the relative
clause. The gerund, again, is in the syntactic position of a subject.
35
In another analysed example, the extra clause, which was used, is more appropriate when
translating.
→ The wet weather discouraged many people from going to the sports meeting.
“Vlhké počasí odradilo mnoho lidí, aby šlo na zápas.” (Dušková, 1994 : 573) This time, Dušková
used the nominal objective clause. We can notice that the English gerund is used after the
preposition (I’m afraid of going there. He encouraged me into coming soon. I’m looking forward
to seeing you again., etc.). Another possible translation, using the anaphoric expression, would
be: “Vlhké počasí odradilo mnoho lidí od toho, aby šlo na zápas.” The gerund in the English
example sentence stands in the position of an object.
→ training sportsmen (Dušková, 1994 : 570)
This example is ambiguous because it can have two explanations. Firstly, “trénování sportovců”
which is a gerund form, and secondly, “trénující sportovci” which is an –ing participle. It
depends what is being communicated. We can predetermine a gerund by adding the genitive “of”
in front of this phrase, e.g. the Czech way of training sportsmen. The English gerund functions as
a premodifier.
Similarly in this example:
→ Confiding in him was a mistake. (Dušková, 1994 : 571)
In this case, we can translate the gerund as an infinitive – “Svěřit se mu byla chyba”. If we
wanted to translate it as a verbal noun, this form would be inappropriate for the Czech language
(“Svěření se mu byla chyba.”). The English gerund stands in the position of a subject.
→ I remember locking the door.
“Pamatuju si, že jsem zamkla dveře”: I remember the act of doing it in the past. If we used the to
infinitive here, it would refer to the future – I remember to lock the door: “Myslím na to, že
musím zamknout dveře.” This concludes that the gerund refers to the act of doing an activity in
the past in connection with the verbs like remember, recall, etc. The to infinitive would be in the
position of an adverbial of purpose. The English gerund occurs in the syntactic position of an
object.
The gerund can also occur in the position of a premodifier:
→ chewing gum, copying machine, swimming pool (Dušková, 1994 : 577)
36
As I have already described, the difference between the gerund and –ing participle in such
phrases can be seen by paraphrasing these short phrases – “žvýkací guma = žvýkačka,
rozmnožovací stroj = kopírka, plovárna = bazén na plavání”. As in the example above (training
sportsmen), the English gerund functions as a premodifier.
6.2 Summary of translation of English gerunds into Czech
To summarise, the ways of translating the gerund into the Czech language are as follows:
using the Czech verbal noun ending with –í, e.g koupání, plavání, etc.,
using the Czech deverbal noun, e.g. ztratit – ztráta, chození – docházka, etc.,
using the Czech infinitive ending with –t, e.g. sedět, věřit, etc.,
using the relative clause, e.g. Skutečnost, že obraz nakreslil tak rychle, mě
fascinovala.,
using the subordinate clause, e.g. Pamatuji si, že jsem zamkla dveře., etc.,
using the anaphoric expression, e.g. To, že ten obraz tak rychle nakreslil, mě
fascinovalo., etc.,
using the Czech prefix do- to express that the activity was finished, e.g. Petr
dořídil auto. Dopsala jsem úkol., etc.
using the nominal objective clause, e.g. Vlhké počasí odradilo mnoho lidí od
toho, aby šlo na zápas., etc.
6.3 Translation of –ing participles and clauses
The Czech language uses the subordinate clauses more often than English to avoid the
Czech participle (chapter No. 4). As I have already stated, the participle is used often in English,
but in the Czech language, it should be avoided because it is an archaic expression, used almost
exclusively in literature.
When translating the English participle, Czech people have some problems with word order.
When translating, they try to keep the sentence length and the number of words the same. But
sometimes it is better to use the relative clause to better understand the meaning.
37
The Czech participle has the syntactic function of a complement in a Czech sentence. It can
function either as a Czech complement on its own or a Czech complement relative clause. If
there is a choice to use the Czech complement clause, it is a better option for translating than
using the Czech participial complement. For example:
→ Viděl jsem ho, dívaje se na televizi. – complement
→ Viděl jsem ho, jak se dívá na televizi. – complement subordinate clause
The Czech language uses relative clauses more often since the sentence structure is more
understandable for a Czech-speaking person.
The first two examples to be analysed are as follows:
→ He is going home. vs. He goes home.
I have put these two examples together in order to show the time reference. In the first example,
we can see that the activity is happening at the moment of speaking and could be translated,
adding an extra Czech word as: “Právě jde domů.” By adding the word “právě”, we highlight
that the activity is in progress. On the other hand, the second example expresses an everyday
activity where adding the extra Czech word is not necessary: “Chodí domů.”, meaning every
day. In the English language, adding an extra word is not necessary because, unlike the Czech
language, its formal means (in this moment the present progressive tense) indicate the activity in
progress.
→ I saw him watching TV.
In this case, the translation: “Viděl jsem ho, dívaje se na televizi” would be correct according to
the correct usage of Czech participle endings, but since we have said that we should avoid using
such archaic expressions, the translation “Viděl jsem ho, jak se dívá na televizi” is more
appropriate. It should be noted that we haven’t avoided the Czech participle as such, we have
just replaced it with a participial clause, which is still correct.
In postposition, the attributive –ing participle is used in the same way as the Czech language if it
is complemented with an object or adverbial:
38
→ In psychology, we attempt to state the laws underlying human behaviour (object in
this case23).
According to Dušková (Dušková, 1994 : 581), the Czech translation should be: “V psychologii
se pokoušíme formulovat zákony, na nichž se zakládá lidské chování.” Again, we can see that a
relative clause is used here, but if we translate the sentence using the participle, the sentence
would become: “V psychologii se pokoušíme formulovat zákony, představující základ lidského
chování.”, using the verbal adjective, which is perfectly understandable. So the use of a relative
clause in this case is not necessary. It all depends on the Czech vocabulary which we use in
terms of translation. It is not essential to use relative clauses in all cases.
→ I lay on my bed, tossing restlessly.
“Ležel jsem na lůžku a neklidně se převracel” (Dušková, 1994 : 583). This participial clause was
translated using the conjunction “and” and the superordinate clause. The subject of the English
subordinate clause is identical to the subject of the main clause. Therefore, the participial
transformation is possible.
→ I started the steak thawing.
“Začal jsem řízek rozmrazovat” (Dušková, 1994 : 586). The translation was made using the
Czech infinitive, which is another way of translating the –ing participle into the Czech language.
Changing the word order would be helpful in this case: “Začal jsem rozmrazovat řízek”, because
the infinitive usually follows the main verb in the Czech language if we do not want to
emphasize one of the sentence elements, as in: “Začal jsem ten řízek rozmrazovat”. We can even
replace the word thawing with the to infinitive (I started the steak to thaw).
We already know that the –ing participles can express the time reference:
→ Being removed from school because of ill health, he received a rather unorthodox
education.
“Jelikož byl vzat ze školy pro chatrné zdraví, dostalo se mu dost neortodoxního vzdělání”
(Dušková, 1994 : 583). Dušková used the passive voice for translating this sentence. However,
since the Czech language does not use the passive or tries to avoid it as much as possible using
the general subject, the translation “Jelikož jej odhlásili ze školy kvůli chatrnému zdraví, dostalo
se mu dost neortodoxního vzdělání” is more appropriate. The general subject “oni” (not
23 author’s note
39
expressed in the Czech sentence) is not expressed to avoid defining who removed the boy in
question from school (it is not an important piece of information in this case).
→ Having established a basis for this theory, the next step is the structure and properties
of the components.
“Když jsme pro tuto teorii vytvořili základ, další krok je analyzovat strukturu a vlastnosti složek”
(Dušková, 1994 : 586). This is a typical example of a dangling participle used in professional
literature. A general subject is usually used, the author himself or the readers.
6.4 Summary of translation of –ing participles into Czech
To reiterate, the ways of translating the –ing participles into the Czech language are as follows:
using an extra Czech word, e.g. Právě se dívá na televizi.
using the Czech subordinate complement clause, e.g. Viděl jsem ho, jak se dívá
na televizi., etc.,
using the Czech infinitive, ending with –t, e.g. Začal jsem rozmrazovat řízek.
using the relative clause or a Czech verbal adjective, e.g. V psychologii se
pokoušíme formulovat zákony, na nichž se zakládá lidské chování. V psychologii
se pokoušíme formulovat zákony, představující základ lidského chování.
using two superordinate clauses with a superordinate conjunct “and”, Ležel jsem
na lůžku a neklidně se převracel.
using the general subject, e.g. Jelikož jej odhlásili ze školy kvůli chatrnému
zdraví, dostalo se mu dost neortodoxního vzdělání.
As we can see, neither the gerund nor the –ing participle has one form of translation into
the Czech language. When translating these forms, we have to be careful about Czech syntax
because it is not always appropriate to use the equivalents of these forms – gerund contrasted
with a verbal noun, and –ing participle contrasted with a verbal adjective.
40
Research
41
7 Research
7.1 Introduction to the research
The goal of this research was to find out whether pupils at secondary schools can
translate the gerund and –ing participle in a way which is understandable for a Czech-speaking
person. The research was conducted at three different schools which I chose for their various
locations and level of English. The first is the 2. secondary school ZŠ, Dvořákův okruh 2, Krnov,
where two classes of 9th graders consisting of 38 pupils all together were surveyed. The second is
the 4. secondary school, Žižkova, 3, Krnov, where I gave questionnaires to one class consisting
of 17 pupils. At the third chosen school, the grammar school, Hejčín, Tomkova 45, Olomouc,
two classes of pupils were surveyed, one of which attends the English department (the length of
study is six years) with an extended number of English lessons, and the second, the lower
grammar school. I expected that the classes would have different levels of knowledge of English
because it is commonly known that there are different emphases placed on languages between
grammar schools and secondary schools. The number of English lessons also makes a difference.
The questionnaires are divided into two parts – one part includes the questionnaires from the
pupils from the secondary schools in Krnov and the other part includes the questionnaires from
the pupils from the grammar school in Hejčín, Olomouc. I decided to divide it this way because
the level of their English was different. The pupils at the grammar school in Hejčín have an
extended number of English lessons, and since they attend the English section, the supposed
level should be higher.
Another part of the research is a comparison of the student’s books at the secondary
schools at which the research was conducted. My goal was to compare them in terms of a
curriculum of gerunds and –ing participles: how big the focus on these forms is, if any, how
much space there is for teaching pupils these forms, and how important the books think the
forms are for the pupils.
The results may be ambiguous because the number of samples from the secondary
schools is 55 and 29 from the grammar school making 84 samples overall.
42
7.2 Methods of the questionnaire
The methods used will be an analysis of the translated samples and their comparison with
the possible translations as mentioned in the chapters above, e.g. using the Czech verbal noun
ending with –í, anaphoric expression, the subordinate clause, the Czech deverbal noun, the
relative clause, the Czech infinitive, ending with –t, an extra Czech word, subordinate clause,
two superordinate clauses with a superordinate conjunct, etc. The number of decimal places in
the percentage value was reduced to one.
The next method used will be a comparison with the Czech national corpus. This is a
database of texts, both written and spoken (audio recordings in the case of spoken language),
which is used for language research. It is possible to look for words and phrases in a context and
find their frequency in the corpus and their original text source. All data in the corpus is constant.
The internet evolves very quickly and is changing every day making it impossible to find the
number of words which are included in documents on the internet. These internet documents are
not reliable sources, as they cannot be guaranteed to exist the next day. Therefore, we have the
national corpus which does not change.24
7.3 Questionnaire analysis
I have put together 16 sample sentences, using both the gerund and –ing participle. They
were decided upon according to their syntactic position in the sentence. The number of each
syntactic function is two. As a result, there are 2 example sentences of a gerund as a subject,
object, appositive, and complement, and 2 sentences of –ing participle as a part of a progressive
aspect, sentence condensation, attributive, and complement. The vocabulary used was taken from
the list of A2 level vocabulary which pupils in 9th grade are expected to know.25
To evaluate the questionnaires, the translated sentences are be taken one by one, analysed, and
compared with the Czech equivalents according to the Czech national corpus. The focus is
particularly on the translated forms of the gerunds and –ing participles, not on the vocabulary of
a whole sentence itself. Further on, they are compared with their Czech equivalents as I have
24 Český národní korpus: http://www.korpus.cz/ 25 The list of A2 vocabulary can be found here: http://www.cambridgeesol.tw/userfiles/PDF/KET_V%2008.pdf
43
introduced them in the theoretical part. Some interesting examples of the translations are
mentioned as well along with an explanation as to why they are highlighted.
The pupils of the secondary schools in Krnov have three English lessons per week. The number
of samples at these two schools was 55. The pupils at the grammar school in Hejčín have four
English lessons per week. The number of samples at the grammar school was 29. The answers
are divided according to the type of school, then the final results are combined. The correct
answers include the Czech verbal noun ending with –í and also the Czech deverbal nouns
although these are not the equivalent of the English gerund.
7.3.1 Translating gerund
1. I think that going to school is important for children.
The gerund in this example subordinate clause is in the syntactic position of a subject.
To preserve the gerund in the Czech translation, it should be translated as follows: “Myslím si,
že chození do školy je pro děti důležité.”, using the Czech verbal noun for translation or “Myslím
si, že chodit do školy je pro děti důležité.”, using the Czech infinitive.
According to the answers of the pupils from the secondary school, 41,8% of them translated the
gerund going to school as “chození do školy” which corresponds to the Czech verbal noun. 7,2%
of the pupils translated this gerund as “chodit do školy” which corresponds to the Czech
infinitive. 20% of the pupils did not write down any answer or they started translating the
sentence but they did not finish it. 22,8% of the pupils translated the gerund incorrectly.
In compliance with the Czech national corpus, the most common usage is the expression
“chodit” with 3963 occurrences. The verbal noun “chození” has only 130 occurrences. As a
result, if we want to translate according to the national corpus, we should choose the version
with the infinitive, but from the answers of the pupils, the more common version was “chození”.
Some interesting examples of the pupils’ translation are as follows: “Myslím si, že školní
docházka je pro děti důležitá.” or “Myslím si, že škola je pro děti důležitá.” This Czech
translation was used in 9% of the samples. In the second example, the pupils avoided translating
the gerund completely. In the first example they transformed the verbal noun into a deverbal
noun “docházka” which does not correspond to an English gerund.
44
Some incorrect translations are as follows: “Myslím, že půjdu pro děti do školy., Děti se do školy
transportujou., Myslím, že chodí do školy s populárními dětmi.” In the first example, the pupils
probably confused the gerund going to school with the future going to. But they forgot that for
forming the going to future you need the whole verb to be → I’m going to school. In the third
example, an incorrect translation was caused by a confusion between the word important and the
word popular.
41%
7,2%
20% 22%
9%
chození doškoly
chodit doškoly
no answer
incorrecttranslation
The pupils from the grammar school, Hejčín, had no incorrect answers or any cases where the
sentence could not be translated. From the results, 75,9% of them translated the gerund as
“chození”, using the verbal noun, 20,7% used the infinitive “chodit” and 1 pupil used the
subordinate clause “Mysím si, že je důležité, aby děti chodily do školy.”, which equates to 3,5%.
75,9%
20,9%
3,5%
chození doškolychodit doškolysubordinateclause
Therefore, the most commonly used translation of the gerund phrase going to school from all the
pupils is “chození do školy”, although it does not correspond with the Czech national corpus as
the expression being used the most often. The pupils from the grammar school were more
successful in translating the sentence. The result is that 66,7% of the pupils translated the gerund
correctly, 33,3% incorrectly.
45
66,7%
33,3%correctlyincorrectly
2. My father is responsible for losing my keys.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of a prepositional complement.
The Czech translations of the sentence can be as follows: “Můj otec je zodpovědný za ztrátu
mých klíčů.” or “Můj otec je zodpovědný za to, že ztratil mé klíče.” In the second example, the
subordinate clause was used, and a deverbal noun was used in the first. In accordance with the
Czech national corpus, the occurrence of the word “ztráta” can be found in 2392 examples.
Having looked at the expression “ztracení” (a verbal noun), it is only found in 49 examples. The
usage of the subordinate clause occurs in 3417 examples.
According to the answers of the pupils from both secondary schools, using a deverbal noun
“ztráta” and a verbal noun “ztracení” are most common. 38,1% of the pupils translated the
gerund as “ztráta mých klíčů”, 14,5% of the pupils as “ztracení mých klíčů”. 7,2% of the pupils
used the adjective: “Můj otec je zodpovědný za ztracené klíče.” This would be possible to use in
the Czech language, but the English equivalent for this translation is “my lost keys” where the
past participle was used instead of losing. 40% of the pupils translated the gerund incorrectly or
not at all. In four of the samples, the children confused the subjects and their translation was as
follows: “Můj otec je naštvaný, když ztratím klíče.” where the subject “já” is used. But my father
is the subject of the whole sentence.
38,1%
14,5%
40%
7,2%
ztráta
ztracení
incorrecttranslationpast participle
46
Of the pupils from the Hejčín grammar school, 48,3% used the verbal noun “ztracení”, 20,7%
“ztráta” and 31% did not translate the gerund at all.
20,7%
48,3%
31%ztráta
ztracení
no translationat all
To summarise, the number of correctly translated gerunds is higher for the pupils from the
grammar school. The gerund was translated correctly by 58,3% and incorrectly by 41,7%.
58,3%
41,7%
correctlyincorrectly
3. My friends like playing computer games.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of an object.
The Czech translation is as follows: “Mí přátelé rádi hrají počítačové hry.” or, “Mí přátelé mají
rádi hraní počítačových her.”
89% of the pupils used the first translation, “Mí přátelé rádi hrají počítačové hry.” 5,4% of them
(three samples) used the second translation, “Mí přátelé mají rádi hraní počítačových her.” which
is a literal translation that should be avoided when translating. 5,4% of the samples were
incorrectly translated as “Moji kamarádi hrají počítačové hry.” which translates as an activity
either in progress or a habitual activity. The form in this case would be the –ing participle, not a
gerund.
47
In comparison with the Czech national corpus, the pupils used the translation correctly and in
accordance with the corpus. The occurrence of the expression “hrají” as a translation for like
playing appears in 4827 cases.
Since the phrase “I like doing something.” is known to children very well, they did not have any
problems with translating it and there were no sample sentences which were not translated. All
of them were translated either the first way, or the second way.
89%
5,4% 5,4%
rádi hrají
hraní
incorrecttranslation
From the Hejčín grammar school, 65,5% used the translation “rádi hrají” and 34,5% the verbal
noun “hraní”. No non-translated sentences appeared.
65,5%
34,5% rádi hrají
hraní
To compare these two schools, most pupils preferred using the phrase “rádi hrají” to using “mají
rádi hraní”. A higher number of samples using the phrase “rádi hrají” were taken from the pupils
from the secondary schools.
From the correct translation of the gerund, 96,4% of the pupils used the correct translation and
only 3,6% the incorrect translation.
48
96,4%
3,6%
correctlyincorrectly
4. Your favourite activity, swimming in the ocean, costs money.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of an appositive.
This gerund can be translated either as the Czech verbal noun “plavání” or the infinitive
“plavat”. According to the Czech national corpus, the gerund swimming translated as “plavání”
occurs in 1092 examples and as “plavat” in 593 examples.
In this case, there were no untranslated sentences. All the pupils managed to translate it either as:
“Tvá oblíbená aktivita, plavání v moři, stojí peníze.” or as: “Tvá oblíbená aktivita, plavat v moři,
stojí peníze.” The translation “stojí peníze” was also in the form of “je náročná na peníze” which
I considered as the same in meaning and therefore did not divide it into two different groups.
Since 94,5% of the pupils translated this gerund as a verbal noun “plavání” and not as the Czech
infinitive “plavat”, the first form in this case is considered to be the one which is used
significantly more. Only 5,5% (3 samples overall) of the pupils used the Czech infinitive.
94,5%
5,5%
plaváníplavat
The results from the pupils from the grammar school were 96,6% for the verbal noun “plavání”
and 3,4% for the infinitive “plavat”. All samples were translated in one of these ways.
49
96,6%
3,4%
plaváníplavat
To sum up, in this sentence the word “plavání” is preferred by nearly all the pupils. 95,2% of the
translations were correct and only 4,8% incorrect.
100%
correctly
5. Johnny finished reading the book.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of an object.
In this case, using the prefix “do-“, which marks the finishing of an activity in the Czech
language, is appropriate to use. “Johnny dočetl knihu.” Another option “Johnny dokončil čtení
knihy.” is also appropriate if we want to use the gerund according to the Czech national corpus
(see the results below). The occurrence of the word “čtení” occurred in 2752 samples in the
Czech national corpus, the word “dočetl” only 279.
43,6% of the pupils used the verbal noun “čtení” when translating, 38,1% of them used the
phrase “dočetl knihu”, 7,2% of the pupils used the deverbal noun “četba” which can be
considered as the correct translation as well. The Czech language is a verbal language which
means that it focuses more on verbs than on nouns, the opposite of the English language.
Accordingly, the translation using the version “dočetl” should be preferred. The rest of the
percentages were the translations that can be seen below.
50
Other translations (11,1% overall) of this sample sentence were: “Johnny přečetl knihu., Johnny
přestal číst knížky., Johnny dočítá knížku., Johnny skončil číst knížku.” We can assume that they
confused the gerund with the present progressive tense.
43,6%38,1%
7,2%11,1%
čtení
dočetl knihu
četba
incorrecttranslation
The pupils from the grammar school translated the sentence correctly. No one used the deverbal
noun “četba”. 79,3% used the version with “dočetl” and 20,7% “čtení”. These pupils did not use
the word-for-word translation which was used by some of the pupils from the secondary schools.
20,7%
79,3%
čtení
dočetlknihu
To summarise, the pupils at the grammar school Hejčín do not use word-for-word translations.
The pupils from the secondary schools use it more often. 88,1% of the translations were correct,
11,9% incorrect.
88,1%
11,9%
correctlyincorrectly
51
6. Watching TV gives children new information.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of a subject.
In this case, the Czech verbal noun is used: “Sledování televize dává dětem nové informace.”
87,2% of the pupils used this version, using the verbal noun. Only one sample, which equates as
1,8%, contained the Czech infinitive “dívat se” which can be considered as the correct
translation as well. The other six samples (10,9% overall) were translated using the children as
the subject: “Děti sledují televizi…” usually ending with adding the word “informace”, e.g.
“Děti sledují v televizi nové informace., Děti se dívají na televizi na zprávy.” One sample was
not translated at all. According to the Czech national corpus, the occurrence of the expression
“sledování” occurred in 1829 samples. The infinitive “dívat se” occurred in only 16 examples.
“Díváním se na televizi děti získávají informace.” → in this case, a pupil used the Czech 7th case
(called instrumental). The gerund in this case is in the syntactical position of an adverbial of
manner.
87,2%
1,8%
10,9%
sledování
dívat se
incorrecttranslation
96,6% of the pupils from the grammar school Hejčín used the translation “dívání se” or
“sledování”. None of them used the Czech 7th case. Only 3,4% (one pupil) did not translate the
sentence at all. These pupils did not even use the infinitive “dívat se”. So we can say that the
only translation used by the pupils was the Czech verbal noun “dívání se” or “sledování”.
52
96,6%
3,4%
sledování,dívání seno translationat all
From the results, we can see that the pupils from the grammar school Hejčín did not use the
infinitive “dívat se” at all. The pupils from both types of school preferred using the translation
“sledování” or “dívání se”. 91,7% of all the pupils translated the gerund correctly, 8,3%
incorrectly.
91,7%
8,3%
correctlyincorrectly
7. My mother’s hobby is sitting in the garden.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of a complement.
The Czech translation of this sentence is as follows: “Koníčkem mojí mámy je sezení (sedět) na
zahradě.” or “Moje máma ráda sedí na zahradě.”, but in the second example, the English
structure would be different (My mother likes sitting in the garden.). To preserve the translation,
using the first example is more appropriate.
In 72,7% of the samples, the pupils used the expressions “sedění”, “sezení” and “vysedávání.”
Considering the Czech language, the word “sedění” is incorrect from the point of view of
standard Czech but was used often in the pupils’ answers. According to the Czech national
corpus, there are only 27 occurrences of this expression and 64 occurrences of the word
“vysedávání”. On the other hand, the expression “sezení” has 732 occurrences. The expression
“sezení” was used by 49,1% of the pupils, “sedění” 18,1% of the pupils, and only 5,4% of the
53
pupils used the translation “vysedávání”. All of these forms are verbal nouns. Only one pupil
was not able to translate the sentence at all (1,8%). Therefore, to follow standard Czech, we
should use the translation “Koníčkem mojí mámy je sezení na zahradě.”
The other options of translating this sentences were “Hobby mojí mámy je sedět na zahradě.”
where 12,7% of the pupils used the Czech infinitive “sedět”. The same number of pupils
translated the sentence using the expression “ráda sedí” as mentioned above.
49,1%
18,1%
5,4%12,7% 12,7%
1,8%
sezeníseděnívysedávánísedětráda sedíno translation at all
As for the pupils from the grammar school, 86,3% of them used the word “sezení”, 10,3% the
non-standard Czech word “sedění” and 3,4% the word “vysedávání”. No one used the infinitive
“sedět”.
86,3%
10,3% 3,4%
sezeníseděnívysedávání
Both groups of pupils preferred using the word “sezení”, although the pupils from the grammar
school used it more often than the pupils from the secondary schools. On the other hand, the
occurrence of non-translated samples counted as only 1,8%. 90,5% of the pupils used the correct
translation of the gerund, 9,5% were incorrect.
54
90,5%
9,5%
correctlyincorrectly
8. Her job, analysing data, is quite boring.
The gerund in this example sentence is in the syntactic position of an appositive.
According to the Czech national corpus, the most occurrences can be found for the translation
“Její práce, analýza dat (or analyzovat data), je celkem nudná.” which is a deverbal noun,
making 1584 occurrences overall. The expression “analyzovat” has 624 occurrences, and the
verbal noun “analyzování” has only 31 occurrences. Therefore, the translated sentence with
either the expression “analýza” or “analyzovat” is considered to be the most used according to
the corpus.
Surprisingly, the most used phrase was the one with the least number of occurrences in the
national corpus – “analyzování”. 36,4% of the pupils used this translation. 25,5% of them used
the translation with “analyzovat” and only 22% used the most common usage according to the
Czech national corpus, “analýza”.
From the results, we can say that for the translation of this appositive gerund, the pupils use the
Czech verbal noun “analyzování”, which differs in comparison with the most common
expression according to the Czech national corpus, “analýza”.
Other translations included: “Její práce, analyzuje data, je nic moc.” or “Její práce analyzovala
data a je nudná.” The pupils probably translated it word for word26 and did not focus on the
meaning itself.
26 also called a calque – author’s note
55
36,4%
25,5%22%
16,1%
analyzování
analyzovat
analýza
incorrecttranslation
According to the answers of the pupils from the grammar school, 65,5% of the pupils used the
translation “analyzování”, 13,8% “analýza” and the infinitive “analyzovat” and 6,9% used the
word “analyzace” which does not occur in the Czech national corpus.
65,5%
13,8% 13,8%6,9%
analyzováníanalyzovatanalýzaanalyzace
From the total results, we can show that the expression which is preferred by both types of
school is the Czech verbal noun “analyzování”. 89,3% of the translations were correct, 10,7%
were incorrect.
89,3%
10,7%
correctlyincorrectly
56
7.3.2 Summary of translated gerunds and comparison of schools
To sum up all the translations of the gerund, the pupils used the verbal noun with the
ending –í more often, although it was not appropriate in all cases. The pupils from the secondary
schools used it in 6 out of 8 cases (chození, plavání, čtení, sledování, sezení (sedění,
vysedávání), analyzování) and the pupils from the grammar school in 6 out of 8 cases as well
(analyzování, sezení (sedění, vysedávání), sledování (dívání se), plavání, ztracení, chození). As a
result, we can say that translating the English gerund as a Czech verbal noun is used most often.
From all the possible translations which I have stated in chapter 6.2, we can say that the most
usual ones are a Czech verbal noun, a Czech deverbal noun (which is not a gerund), the Czech
infinitive ending with –t, and the subordinate clause. The deverbal noun is not an equivalent of
the English gerund, but since the pupils used the Czech verbal noun as a translation of the
English gerund, it can be considered as a used version of translation.
Only sentence no. 1 showed more than 15% of the pupils having some difficulties with
translation or not translating the sentence at all. It may be caused by the fact that the children
confused this gerund with the going to future. Another reason may be the position of the gerund.
In this sentence, it has the function of a subject but of a subordinate clause.
The pupils showed that in the majority of cases they know how to use the gerund in a sentence.
This topic is not taught in secondary schools, however, as we will have a chance to see further on
in the chapter comparing the student’s books.
7.3.3 Translating –ing participles
1. Susan is bringing me an apple.
The syntactic function of this –ing participle is a part of a present progressive tense.
The correct form is the one where the Czech progressive tense is used. Therefore the translation
is as follows: “Susan (Zuzana) mi zrovna nese jablko.” or “Zuzana mi přináší jablko.” In the first
example, the word “zrovna” expresses an additional piece of information which shows that the
activity is in progress. According to the Czech national corpus, there are 3681 occurrences for
the first example with “nese” and 4774 occurrences for the word “přináší”. What the pupils
should primarily express is the progressive aspect.
57
Pupils translations are as follows: only 21,8% translated the sentence correctly and 9% more at
least used the progressive aspect making 30,8% overall. Some of the examples of the progressive
aspect used by the pupils are as follows: “krájí, podává, bere”, etc.
The rest of the translations used expressions such as “donesla” or “vzala” where the pupils
confused the present progressive aspect with the past tense. The translations were as follows:
“Zuzana mi vzala jablko.” or “Zuzana mi donesla jablko.” Out of the total 55 questionnaires,
36,4% of the pupils translated the sentence using the past simple tense instead of the present
progressive. 16,4% of them were not able to translate the sentence at all, while 12,7% used a
different translation but preserved the past tense. 3,7% translated the verb bring correctly but
used “je přinášející”
The pupils had difficulties recognizing that they were translating the present progressive tense.
Since the present progressive tense is taught in 6th grade and revised many times in the following
three grades, these are unexpected results.
21,8%
9%
36,4%
12,7%16,4%
3,7%
nese, přináší
wrong verb, presentprogressivedonesla
past tense, wrong verb
no tranastion at all
je přinášející
From the results of the pupils from the grammar school, the most used translation was “nese” or
“přináší”, expressing the progressive aspect. 75,9% of them used this translation. 13,8% used the
past tense instead of the present progressive tense and 10,3% used a different translation of the
verb bringing but preserving the progressive aspect.
75,9%
10,3%13,8%
nese, přináší
wrong verb,presentprogressiveusing the pasttense
58
The pupils from the grammar school showed the ability to express the progressive aspect in
comparison to the pupils from the secondary schools. From the results, we can see that there was
no sample from the pupils from the grammar school which was not translated or translated word
for word (přinášející, see above). 40,5% were correct translations, 9,5% of the pupils used at
least the progressive aspect and 50% translated the gerund incorrectly. The results were equal.
50% 50%
correctlyincorrectly
2. At the station, you will see a small child looking for his parents.
The function of this –ing participle is a sentence condensation.
The translations can be as follows: “Na zastávce uvidíš male dítě, které hledá své rodiče.”, “Na
zastávce uvidíš malé dítě hledající své rodiče.” or “Na zastávce uvidíš male dítě hledat své
rodiče.” (a subordinate clause, verbal adjective, and an infinitive). According to the Czech
national corpus, the word “hledající” occurs in only 286 samples, on the other hand 4307
samples were found for the expression “hledá”. The infinitive “hledat” has 6035 occurrences.
In comparison with the answers of the pupils, 21,8% of them used the translation with
“hledající”, the same number used “dívající” which is not a correct translation of the expression
look for but at least the verbal adjective was preserved. 23,6% translated the sentence incorrectly.
Only 9% used the infinitive “hledat”, the same number used the subordinate clause “které
hledá”. 14,5% did not translate the sentence at all. Some of the incorrect translations are: “Na
stanici uvidíš male dítě s jeho rodiči., Na stadioně jsem viděl male dítě s jeho rodiči.”
As a summary, the translations which can be taken as correct amount to 61,8%. Included in this
number is the translation of look for as “dívat se”, although the meaning is incorrect. The most
important fact here was the translation of the word, using the verbal adjective.
59
9%
21,8% 21,8% 23,6%
9%
14,5%
které hledá
hledajícídívající seincorrect translation
hledatno translation at all
According to the results of the pupils from the grammar school, the most used translation was the
verbal adjective “hledající” which counted for 72,4% of the results. The infinitive “hledat” was
used by 3,4%, the relative clause was used by 10,4% and 13,8% did not translate the word
looking for correctly but preserved the verbal adjective ending with –í.
72,4%
3,4%
10,3% 13,8%
hledající
hledat
relative clause
incorrecttranslation
Unlike the pupils from the secondary schools, the pupils from the grammar school used the
translation “hledající” in 72,4% of all samples. The infinitive “hledat” was used just by 3,4%, the
relative clause by 10,4% and an incorrect translation was given by 13,8%.
The pupils from the secondary schools had more difficulties translating this sentence. From their
results, the highest percentage was from incorrect translations. On the other hand, five of them
used the relative clause in comparison with the pupils from the grammar school where it was
used by only one of them. 56% of all the translations were correct, 47% were incorrect.
60
56%
44%
correctlyincorrectly
3. This is interesting information for me.
The syntactic function of this –ing participle is an adjective (attribute).
The translation of this participle is “zajímavá”. It has 1525 occurrences in the Czech national
corpus. Accordingly, the translation is as follows: “Toto je pro mě zajímavá informace.” or “Tato
informace je pro mě zajímavá.”
From the results, this translation was easier for the pupils. 69,1% of them used the correct
translation “zajímavá”. 16,4% translated it incorrectly but used a different word, e.g. “důležitá,
nova, nepříjemná” etc. which can be still considered as using the correct form of the participle.
14,5% did not translate the sentence correctly at all, using neither the word “zajímavý” or a
verbal adjective.
69,1%
16,4% 14,5%
zajímavá
differentadjectiveincorrecttranslation
Unlike the pupils from the secondary schools, from all the results of the pupils of the grammar
school, there was only one incorrect answer where the pupil used a different translation. 96,6%
were correct and the one incorrect answer equals 3,4%.
61
96,6%
3,4%
zajímavá
differentadjective
Better results were shown by the pupils from the grammar school. It was quite surprising that
there were so many incorrect translations because the word interesting is a commonly used
adjective and an equal number of correct answers was expected from the pupils from the
secondary schools. 78,6% were correct answers, 10,7% of which were different adjectives and
10,7% were incorrect answers.
89,3%
10,7%
correctlyincorrectly
4. I saw him watching TV.
The syntactic function of this –ing participle is a complement.
Here there are three possibilities for translating: using the subordinate nominal clause of
complement or an infinitive. “Viděla jsem ho, jak se dívá na televizi.” → this is the subordinate
clause. “Viděla jsem ho dívat se na televizi.” → this is the infinitive, and “Viděla jsem ho
dívajícího se na televizi.” → this is the adjective. According to the Czech national corpus, the
number of occurrences of the phrase “jak se dívá” is only 15, but if we consider only the word
“dívá”, the number is much higher – 1612. The number of cases of the infinitive “dívat se” is
442 and only 14 samples for the adjective “dívající se”.
Originally, this sentence was assumed to be one of the difficult ones, but surprisingly, the pupils
managed the translation very well. 50,9% of them used the translation with the infinitive but only
62
5,5% of them used the subordinate clause. 56,4% of the answers were correct overall. Another
translation was using the verbal adjective “dívající” which was used by only 3,6% (in the Czech
national corpus, there are only two occurrences). 38,1% of the samples used an incorrect
translation: “Díval jsem se na jeho televizi., Díval jsem se s ním na televizi.” etc.
More than half of the samples were correctly translated and we can suppose that the pupils can
use the English complement.
5,5%
50,9%
3,6%
38,1%jak se dívá
dívat se
dívající se
incorrecttranslation
From the results of the pupils from the grammar school, 31% of them used the translation
“dívajícího se”, and the same number used the subordinate nominal complement clause “jak se
dívá na TV”. 13,8% used the translation with the infinitive “sledovat” and 24,7% the infinitive
“dívat se”. Apart from the non-translated samples, the pupils were able to translate all mostly
correctly.
31%
38%
31%
jak se dívá
dívat se,sledovat dívající se
To sum up, just the like the pupils from the secondary schools, the majority of pupils from the
grammar school used the infinitive “dívat se” or “sledovat” which we can consider to be the
most used answer for this question. But, unlike the pupils from the secondary schools, the pupils
from the grammar school were able to translate the sentence as either one of the predicted ways.
From all the answers, 73,8% were correct and 26,2% were incorrect.
63
73,8%
26,2%
correctlyincorrectly
5. All my friends came to the party, eating hamburger.
The function of this –ing participle is a sentence condensation.
In this sentence, using the Czech participle is possible: “Všichni mí přátelé přišli na párty, jedíce
hamburger.” or “Všichni mí přátelé přišli na párty a jedli hamburger.” It is possible to use either
the Czech participle or the superordinate clause connected to the first superordinate clause with a
conjunct. In the Czech national corpus, we can find no case of using the Czech participle, which
supports the fact that Czech participles are archaic expressions and are not used in everyday
Czech. For the expression “jedli”, 429 occurrences can be found. Since this is an example of a
sentence condensation which the pupils do not know, the high number of incorrect answers was
expected. What was also expected was the the verbal adjective “pojídající”.
The results showed that 56,4% of the pupils’ answers were incorrect. They were using the clause
of purpose instead – “Všichni mí přátelé přišli na párty jíst hamburgery.” 18,2% of them used the
correct translation: “Všichni mí přátelé přišli na párty a jedli hamburgery.” 12,7% used the
verbal adjective “pojídající”, and 10,9% used the correct translation but forgot to use the
conjunction. Still, I considered this translation to be correct. We call this phenomenon a
juxtaposition which means connecting the superordinate clause but without any connector. One
pupil did not translate the sentence at all.
Although the children do not know sentence condensation, they are still able to translate it in
some cases and when they do not translate it correctly, they at least use the adverbial or purpose.
41,8% of the pupils translated the sentence well.
64
18,2%12,7% 10,9%
56%
two mainclausespojídající
no conjunction
incorrecttranslation
For the pupils from the secondary schools, the results were various. Most translations used the
Czech archaic participle (44,8% overall) but 31% used the incorrect ending (“jedíc”). 13,8%
translated the sentence completely correctly. 13,8% used the juxtaposition, 6,9% used the word
“pojídající”, 20,7% translated the sentence incorrectly, 3,4% (one pupil) did not translate it at all,
and 10,3% used the clause of purpose. As a result, the most translations used the Czech
participle.
13,8%
31%
13,8%10,3%
6,9%
20,7%
3,4%
correct Czech participleincorrect Czech participleno conjunctionclause of purposepojídajícíincorrect translation no translation at all
The pupils from the grammar school can use the Czech participle although with an incorrect
ending. The pupils from the secondary schools showed more incorrect translations, using mainly
the clause of purpose. The pupils from the grammar school showed more variation of translation.
13 of the pupils from the grammar school used the Czech participle, but 9 of them with the
incorrect ending and only four of them with the correct one. 60,7% of all of the pupils did not
translate the participle correctly at all and 39,3% correctly. From these results, we can see that
the majority of the pupils do not know how to use sentence condensation.
65
39,3%
60,7%
correctlyincorrectly
6. Mrs. Carlson is walking to work. vs. Mrs. Carlson walks to work.
The syntactic function of this –ing participle is a part of a present progressive tense.
These two sentences were contrasted to find out if the pupils could recognize the difference
between the present simple and progressive tenses. The translations are as follows: “Paní
Carlsonová jde právě do práce (pěšky).” using an extra word to express the activity in progress
or “Paní Carlsonová je (pěšky) na cestě do práce.” and “Paní Carlsonová chodí do práce pěšky.”
The Czech national corpus found 35086 cases of using the word “jde” and 4673 for “chodí”.
According to the results of the pupils, 49,1% of them translated the first sentence correctly, using
the present progressive tense and 54,5% translated the second sentence, using the present simple
tense. The number of incorrect answers where the pupils used mostly the past tense is 38,2% for
the first sentence and 32,7% for the second sentence. 12,7% of the pupils confused the two
tenses.
In some cases, an extra word could be found. It was mostly the word “zrovna” or “ted” so we can
say that some pupils realized the difference between these two tenses even in Czech and were
able to express it. Since not all Czech verbs are able to express the difference between an activity
in progress and habitual activity, it is sometimes appropriate to use an extra Czech word to
distinguish these two types of activity.
As a summary, the pupils had some difficulties in translating the example with the present
progressive tense but the difficulties were minimal. On the other hand, what is surprising is the
fact that more than 35% used the past simple tense in either the first or the second sentence,
although the pupils start learning the present progressive tense in 6th grade and make many
revisions in the following grades.
66
49,1%54,5%
38,2%32,7%
12,7%
jde
chodí
šla instead ofjdešla instead ofchodímistakentenses
Unlike the pupils from the secondary schools, the pupils from the grammar school showed better
results again. 86,2% of them correctly translate both the tenses, sometimes expressing the extra
word “právě”. 10,3% mistook the tenses and only one pupil (3,4%) translated the sentence
incorrectly, using the past tense.
86,2% 86,2%
10,3%3,4%
jde
chodí
mistakentensesincorrecttranslation
The results show that the pupils from the grammar school have better preparation that includes
the present simple and progressive tense. They are able to recognize the difference between these
two tenses. The pupils from the secondary schools can recognize the present simple but have
some difficulties recognizing the progressive tense. Out of all the translations, 64,3% were
correct and 35,7% incorrect.
64,3%
35,7% correctlyincorrectly
67
7. A flying plane is high in the sky.
The syntactic function of this –ing participle is an adjective (attribute).
The translation of this sentence is as follows: “Letící (létající) letadlo je vysoko na nebi.”
According to the Czech national corpus, there are 286 occurrences of the word “létající” and 212
of the word “letící”.
The majority of the pupils used the correct translation – 45,5% overall. 25,5% did not translate it
correctly, 5,5% did not attempt it and 23,6% confused the adjective with the present progressive
tense, using the translation “Letadlo letí vysoko ve vzduchu.”
45,5%
25,5%
5,5%
24%
letící
incorrecttranslation
no translationat all
confused withpresentprogressive
The grammar school pupils’ results showed more correct answers than at the pupils of the
secondary schools. 75,9% used the verbal adjective “letící”, 20,7% did not translate the participle
at all and one pupil (3,4%) used the present progressive tense “Letadlo letí…”. One of the
students tried to translate the phrase “flying plane” as “létající talíř”.
75,9%
20,7%
3,4%
letící
incorrectanswer presentprogressive
To summarise, the verbal adjective was used by the most number of pupils from both types of
school. The number of incorrect answers was almost the same in both groups of pupils. Overall,
56% of the answers were correct and 44% incorrect.
68
56%
44%
correctlyincorrectly
8. I hate him lying about school.
The syntactic function of this –ing participle is a complement.
The translation of this sentence, using the subordinate nominal object clause is: “Nesnáším, když
lže o škole.” 342 occurrences for the word “lže” are found in the Czech national corpus. Another
option can be “Nesnáším jeho lhaní o škole.” with 118 occurences.
According to the pupils answers, there is one more possibility for translating it but the structure
is changed – the pronoun in object case him is changed into a possessive pronoun “jeho” = his.
“Nesnáším jeho lhaní o škole.”, which was used by 40% of the pupils. Only 16,4% used the
translation with the subordinate object clause and 38,1% used an incorrect translation, using
various different structures: “Nesnáším ho ve škole., Nesnáším školu.”, etc. 5,5% of the pupils
did not attempt to translate the sentence.
The pupils avoided using the subordinate objective clause and instead tried to translate the
sentence word for word, using the deverbal noun “lhaní”.
16,4%
40% 38,1%
5,5%
subordinateclausejeho lhaní
incorrecttranslationno translationat all
According to the results of the pupils from the grammar school, 51,7% translated the participle,
using the subordinate clause, 34,5% used the translation “lhaní”, 6,9% used an incorrect
69
translation, and only 3,4% did not translate the participle at all. One pupil used the word-for-
word translation “lhajícího”.
51,7%
34,5%
6,9%3,4% 3,4%
subordinateclausejeho lhaní
incorrecttranslationno translation atallword-by-wordtranslation
To sum up, the majority of pupils from the secondary schools used the deverbal noun “lhaní” and
the pupils from the grammar school the subordinate clause. A higher number of incorrect
translations were given by the pupils from the secondary schools. Overall, 66,7% of all the
answers were correct and 33,3% incorrect.
66,7%
33,3%correctlyincorrectly
7.3.4 Summary of translated –ing participles and comparison of schools
Knowledge of the progressive aspect was expected from the pupils who should know and
recognize it, but this was not the case, with the pupils from the secondary schools in particular
having some difficulties with translating. A lot of them had more difficulties with the simple
progressive aspect than with the sentence condensation or with the –ing participle as a
complement. Some of the pupils from both types of school used an extra word to highlight the
progressive aspect. Some of the pupils from the grammar school translated the participle as the
Czech participle although most of them used the incorrect ending.
From all the possible translations which I have stated in chapter 6.4, it can be said that the
majority of translations of the –ing participles use the verbal adjective, the infinitive, an extra
70
Czech word or the adjective. The other possibilities were used as well but not as often as these
listed.
From all the results, it was shown that the pupils had difficulties with the sentence condensation
in sentence no. 5. Some of the pupils were trying to use common sense for this sentence, as was
the case in sentence no. 2.
To compare these results with the results of the gerund translation, we can see that the
pupils had more difficulties with translating the –ing participles. Originally, this was not
expected to be the case due to the fact that, in particular, the present progressive tense is taught
and revised many times throughout secondary school.
7.3.5 Arrangement of the sentences according to the difficulty of translating
According to the results of the pupils, the sentences are listed here in order, with the
sentence with the highest percentage first.
1. Your favourite activity, swimming in
the ocean, costs money. 100%
2. My friends like playing computer
games. 96,4%
3. Watching TV gives children new
information. 91,7%
4. My mother’s hobby is sitting in the
garden. 90,5%
5. Her job, analysing data, is quite
boring. 89,3%
6. This is interesting information for me. 89,3%
7. Johnny finished reading the book. 88,1%
8. I think that going to school is 75,9%
71
important for children.
9. I saw him watching TV. 73,8%
10. I hate him lying about school. 66,7%
11. Mrs. Carlson is walking to work.
Mrs. Carlson walks to work. 64,3%
12. My father is responsible for losing
my keys. 58,3%
13. At the station you will see a small
child looking for his parents. 56%
14. A flying plane is high in the sky. 56%
15. Susan is bringing me an apple. 50%
16. All my friends came to the party,
eating hamburger. 39,3%
Surprisingly, the pupils had the most difficulties with translating the easiest sentences
where the present progressive tense was used (the sentence Susan is bringing me an apple.). The
pupils from the grammar school showed a higher number of the correct answers. The least
problems occurred when translating the gerund in the syntactic position of a subject.
7.4 Student’s Books used at the schools
The student’s books used at these three schools are Maturita solutions (elementary and
pre-intermediate levels), English Plus and Project. The grammar school uses Maturita solutions
and English Plus, and the secondary schools use Project. All of these student’s books are
published by the same publisher – Oxford University Press.
In first of the books, Project, the pupils go through three of these books – 1st, 2nd, and 3rd
levels. In the 1st edition, the present continuous is introduced in unit 6. There are 10 exercises
72
including listening, reading and gap-filling. There is no revision of this tense at the end of the
book. In the 2nd edition, the present continuous is revised in unit 2. This unit is completely
focused on the present progressive tense. There are various exercises but the stress is not on
speaking and it is known that the more one speaks and uses the particular grammar, the more he
learns. There is a very short revision of the unit at the end of the book. In the 3rd book, the
present progressive tense is revised in the introduction of the book and contrasted with the
present simple tense. There are eight exercises focused on this tense. The continuous aspect is
taught again in unit 3 as part of the past tense.
In the Maturita solutions student’s book, the present continuous is introduced in unit 6 of
the elementary level book. The grammar starts with a listening exercise, followed by seven
exercises in the unit and six more in the revision chapter at the end of the unit. Some speaking
exercises are also included in the Teacher’s book. Spelling rules are also included in this book.
The tense is also practiced in the sub-unit in the reading section where the text used is longer
than that found in the Project book. The language review of the unit also includes some practice,
plus there is one listening exercise in the revision of the units 1 – 4. In the next book, pre-
intermediate, unit 1 is focused on the present progressive where it is contrasted with the present
simple tense. The whole unit is focused on the present progressive and present simple and the
differences between these two tenses. In this unit, the gerund is also introduced but not as a
gerund but as a “verb + infinitive or –ing form”. The past progressive is introduced in the next
chapter.
In the English Plus student’s book, the present progressive tense is introduced in unit 4
(the same as in Maturita solutions). The first introduction of the tense has 6 exercises but the
pupils first have to deduce the form from the text on the previous page. In the next exercise, they
have to deduce the spelling rules as well. Speaking is included, too. The following four pages
practice the tense and are divided into different skills – speaking, writing, and listening. There
are many exercises so there is a lot of space for practicing. There is, of course, a review at the
end of the unit. The communicative review, which is the second page of the review part, focuses
primarily on speaking and communication. At the end of the book, in the “Extra listening and
speaking” section, one can find some additional exercises, mainly listening, to practice the tense,
as well as one more reading in the “Culture” section. With this number of exercises, the
secondary schools are not able to complete them all. In the pre-intermediate book, the present
progressive is revised in unit 2. There are speaking and grammar exercises in the language focus
section (1 speaking exercise, 5 grammar exercises) and on the following page where the
73
questions are revised separately in 6 exercises (1 speaking exercise, 1 listening exercise, 4
grammar exercises + rules deduction). In the review part, there are 5 exercises (1 speaking, 4
grammar exercises). The progressive aspect is taught again in unit 4 but as a part of the past
tense. There are 2 whole pages focused only on this aspect where the grammar exercises are
combined with speaking. In the review part, there are 2 full pages of different exercises.
The interesting thing about the books is that in the Project and Maturita solutions books, the
present progressive tense is practiced with vocabulary connected with clothes and dressing (e.g.
I’m wearing a blouse today., etc.) but in English Plus with animals.
As for the gerund, there is no mention of it as a gerund but the pupils are taught it in the form of
verb + infinitive or –ing.
To summarise, the textbook with the biggest emphasis on the present progressive tense is English
Plus. It is used by the pupils from the English section from the grammar school Hejčín where
they have enough lessons to practice it fully. The pupils from the secondary schools do not have
this opportunity, but there are still enough exercises for practicing in the Project book. But there
are still enough exercises for practising in the Project book, and compared to Maturita solutions,
the revision is more frequent.
7.5 Conclusion of the research
According to the research, it has been found that the most commonly used translation of
the gerund is the Czech verbal noun ending with –í, e.g. plavání, kreslení, etc. that is an
equivalent for the English gerund, which confirms the first hypothesis. The Czech verbal noun
was the most frequent translation, used in three quarters of the sentences with gerunds. Apart
from this form, the pupils also used the Czech deverbal noun, although it is not an equivalent for
the English gerund, and they also, in some cases, used a word-for-word translation which was
often chaotic. Both results confirm the second and fourth hypotheses. From the comparison of
the student’s books, it was found out that the term “gerund” does not appear there but the form us
used, e.g. Swimming is my hobby, but it is called verb + infinitive or –ing. The pupils can deal
with its translation quite easily. This confirms the third hypothesis.
As for the translation of –ing participles and the fifth and sixth hypotheses, the pupils have some
difficulties with recognizing and translating the present progressive tense. They confuse it with
the past simple or with the present simple tenses. As we can see from the list of the sentences
74
arranged according to their difficulty of translation, the sentences in which the present
progressive tense was used are placed 11th and 15th, despite the fact that, from the comparison of
the student’s books, revision is made often, especially in the Project and English Plus student’s
books. In the Maturita solutions student’s book, the revision is not that frequent (only at the
beginning of the pre-intermediate book). The reason for such results may be the fact that the
pupils do not realize that the progressive aspect exists in the Czech language as well but in a
different form than in the English language, or perhaps they do not realize it since it is their
native language. In the case of the 5th hypothesis regarding Czech archaic participles, a higher
number of these forms was expected but the pupils did not use them that often. There were only
a few samples with these forms and when they were used, they had an incorrect ending.
75
8 Conclusion
The English system of tenses is sometimes difficult for a learner to understand, just as in
any other foreign language. The focus group of this thesis was the pupils at the secondary
schools where the progressive aspect is introduced.
Both these forms, the gerund and –ing participle, have many different translations in the
Czech language as stated in chapter 6, and also many syntactic roles in a sentence. Although the
pupils do not know the term gerund or –ing participle, they use the forms very often but translate
it incorrectly in some cases. They are sometimes not able to express the difference between the
present progressive and simple present tenses where the –ing participle occurs. As for the
gerund, they also have some difficulties with translation but they always find a way to translate it
into the Czech language, most often by using a Czech deverbal noun. Even though this is not the
equivalent of the English gerund, it can still be accepted as a translation.
Both the theoretical part and the research are useful in the fact that it helps us to structure
all the possible translations of both the gerund and the –ing participle. Since the Czech language
is rich as for the vocabulary, there is not only one translation of both these forms. Furthermore, it
helps us to realize that the bad translation of these forms can cause the change of the meaning.
Therefore all the Czech learners should be careful about the translation. The research can be used
by the Czech teachers of English in showing the pupils that there is not only one Czech
translation of the meaning of –ing forms and that they have more possibilities. It can be also used
for distinguishing the –ing forms according to their position in a sentence which can help the
pupils to recognize a noun with the –ing ending from a verb in present progressive tense.
To finish this diploma thesis, I will use the quote by the Italian writer Leonardo Sciascia:
"The best thing on translation was said by Cervantes: translation is the other side of a tapestry."
Though it isn't exactly what was intended, the original idea still shows through.
76
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Jméno a příjmení: Bc. Zuzana Kopecká
Katedra: Katedra anglického jazyka a literatury
Vedoucí práce: Mgr. Silvie Válková, Ph.D.
Rok obhajoby: 2012
Název práce: Gerundia a přítomná participia a jejich překlad do češtiny
Název v angličtině: Gerunds and –ing participles and their translation into Czech
Anotace práce: Tato diplomová práce popisuje jednu z neurčitých slovesných tvarů, a to přítomná participia (v angličtině –ing participles). Shrnuje formy, které se nazývají gerundia a přítomná participia. Popisuje také různé pohledy různých lingvistů na tyto formy a jaké jsou jejich funkce ve větě a také, co vyjadřují. V další kapitole jsou popsána česká participia přítomná a minulá a jaké jsou jejich správné koncovky, jelikož si je rodilí mluvčí češtiny někdy pletou. V poslední kapitole jsem se zaměřila na překlad těchto participiálních forem a jak vypadá jejich správný překlad v češtině, aby byly pro rodilého mluvčího češtiny srozumitelné. Výzkumná část obsahuje analýzu dotazníku, který jsem rozdala na základních školách v Krnově a Olomouci. Na tomto dotazníku bych chtěla ukázat, že ačkoliv děti termín „gerundium“ neznají, běžně jej používají. Poté bych se chtěla zaměřit i na překlad participií. Mým cílem bylo ukázat, že žáci mají problémy s překladem některých těchto forem, vyskytujících se ve větě, popř. že je překládají jako český již zastaralý přechodník. A když už je používají, tak je používají se špatnými koncovkami. Příkladové věty jsem vzala ze své učitelské praxe a také podle toho, jakou syntaktickou pozici v nich gerundia a participia zastávají.
Klíčová slova: Anglická gerundia, anglická přítomná participia, česká participia, infinitivy, překlad, neurčitý tvar sloves, slovesný vid, slovesný rod, průběhový čas, spisovná čeština
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Anotace v angličtině: This diploma thesis describes one of the non-finite forms of verbs, –ing participles. It summarises these non-finite –ing verb forms called the gerund and the –ing participles. It describes various views of several grammarians, and the differences in their view of the gerund's and –ing participle functions and what they express. The next chapter will introduce the Czech present and past participles and shows the correct endings of both the participles. In the final chapter, I made a basic comparison between English and Czech concerning these forms and how they are translated into the Czech language so as to be understandable for the Czech native speaker. In the research part, conducted at secondary schools in Krnov and Olomouc, I would like to show that pupils do not know the term “gerund”, although they use it quite often. I then focus on various translations of these non-finite forms. My aim is to show that pupils have some difficulties with translation of these forms into Czech. They translate it incorrectly, sometimes using the archaic Czech participle which corresponds with the English –ing participle and gerund. Example sentences are be taken from my teaching practice and according to various syntactic positions in a sentence
Klíčová slova v angličtině: English gerunds, English –ing participles, Czech participles, infinitives, translation, non-finite verb forms, aspect, voice, progressive tense, standard Czech
Přílohy vázané v práci: X
Rozsah práce: 80 stran
Jazyk práce: anglický
